


If the Silence Takes You, Then I Hope It Takes Me Too

by geekprincess26



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Angst, Drama, F/M, Illness, Misunderstandings, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-01
Updated: 2017-06-15
Packaged: 2018-11-07 12:34:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11059080
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/geekprincess26/pseuds/geekprincess26
Summary: Anke, an apprentice healer of the Free Folk, thinks Queen Sansa is mooning far too much over the loutish young lord who wants to marry her.  A simple potion should help to rid her of her silliness...except that it wasn't supposed to contain a deadly poison.  Now the queen is fighting for her life, and Lord Jon Snow would gladly give his a second time and walk through all seven hells in exchange for the chance to tell Sansa the secret he's been harboring for years.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts), [sassyclassy_ass](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sassyclassy_ass/gifts).



> This story is based on a summary prompt written by beyondmythought_s for sassyclassy_ass on Tumblr. I owe both of these wonderful ladies a debt of gratitude for both their permission to write a full-fledged story based on the prompt and their willingness to provide feedback on it. Therefore, it is my pleasure to dedicate this work to them.

Anke hadn’t meant to do it.

 

She hadn’t meant to poison the Queen in the North.

 

She’d only intended to give Queen Sansa enough of the blue winterberries to send her into an unbreakable sleep for a night and a day, so that the big blond kneeler lord would leave Winterfell and not steal her. Kneeler women, unlike their counterparts among the Free Folk, were not wont to fight back when their men stole them at the feasts the kneelers held after their binding ceremonies. Why, Tormund Giantsbane himself had said that the Queen Sansa had had a binding ceremony with that monster Ramsay Bolton, whom any Free Folk woman would have gutted like a fish rather than allow him to steal her. But Queen Sansa had not fought the Bolton monster, and instead she had suffered cruelly for it.

 

So if Queen Sansa had not fought the Bolton creature, she would likely not fight any man to whom she was bound. Granted, such a man must first win his permission for the binding from the Queen’s cousin and heir, Lord Jon Snow. And Lord Jon clearly did not want to give that permission. Instead, he groused and growled worse than a hungry bear whenever a young lord visited Winterfell to seek the young Queen’s hand in marriage. That always vexed the Queen, who on such occasions seemed more concerned with ensuring that her cousin did not challenge the young lords to fight than she seemed pleased to speak to any of the lords herself, or to dance with them at feasts. It was clear to anyone with eyes that Queen Sansa would rather fight all of them off herself than be bound to any of them, but she was after all a kneeler, and kneelers did have the strangest ideas about pretending to like other kneelers, even they would have loved nothing more than to skewer them or drive them away. Even Lord Jon, whom Anke would have loved to see fight off those other kneeler lords, would always give in when the Queen asked him to keep from challenging anybody to combat, although according to Tormund, he would give in only because it was the Queen who had asked, and no one else.

 

Anke herself, who had taken up permanent residence in Winterfell as she finished her apprenticeship with Murron, the aging Free Folk healer, had seen ample evidence to prove Tormund’s point. For one thing, Anke had passed by the council chambers on her way to the healers’ quarters from gathering herbs and roots outside prior to several of the kneeler lords’ visits and had witnessed the effectiveness of Queen Sansa’s persuasions herself. Sometimes she asked in that sweet voice of hers that had managed to charm even Anke’s ornery clan, and sometimes she yelled at him with her blue eyes flashing fiercely, but he capitulated every time. For another thing, Tormund would sometimes return from council meetings to report that the Queen had managed to talk the Lord Jon into changing his mind or at least listening to her about some matter or another about which even Tormund and Lord Davos, Lord Jon’s best friend, had despaired of moving the man’s stubborn resolve. Anke had heard some of Winterfell’s more loose-tongued servants whispering that it was as if the Queen had bewitched Lord Jon, and had snorted when she’d heard it. True bewitchment took hard work, much patience, and just the right potions, and at any rate, while the Queen had shown the utmost respect for the Free Folk way of life, she would never have engaged one of them to help her bewitch anybody.

 

But if the Queen Sansa had managed to soften the brooding lord’s harsher edges, Lord Jon himself had done much to boost her confidence and that of the kneeler lords in her ability to be an effective ruler. After the war against the Walkers had ended and Lord Jon’s strange, dragon-riding aunt had gone back to rule the south, Lord Jon had not only refused to go with her, but had been the first of the kneeler lords to kneel before his cousin and proclaim her queen when the council had met to settle the matter of who would rule the North. He had promptly directed his fiercest glare toward those few lords who had hesitated on account of the Queen’s being a woman.

 

“Do you wish to forsake your oaths to House Stark?” he had growled while glaring at some lord named Cerwyn. He had looked as though he might grab the young lord by the scruff of his neck at any moment, and the other man had shrunk back under the Lord Jon’s withering glare. “Lady Sansa Stark is its trueborn heir. She ruled the North in my absence before, and she ruled it well. Let any man who believes she did not step out of this room and go home a coward.”

 

After that, all the lords had knelt at once to proclaim Lady Sansa as their queen, and before long, even those who had been reluctant to support her had been won over by her fairness, her generosity, and her dedication to rebuilding the shattered strongholds of the North. Night after night she had remained for long hours in the council chamber or the solar, reviewing letters and petitions and supply lists, often with the Lord Jon at her side. Morning after morning, she had awakened early to distribute bread to the orphaned children in Winterfell who had lost their parents in the war, or to take sword lessons from the Lord Jon, or to supervise the rebuilding and expansion of Winterfell. She never hesitated to perform her duties, but when Lord Jon was at her side, she seemed calmer without fail, and much more apt to smile and even joke with the people she encountered. The tension that normally tightened her body like a bowstring when surrounded by men all but disappeared. And when on occasion she rode out to visit one or another of the castles being rebuilt on her orders, the Lord Jon would always ride out at her side. He even accompanied her when she visited the godswood, and she would suffer no other to do so.

 

Anke had witnessed them on more than one such foray while she had been and gathering roots and herbs from the bushes by the side of the path they had traveled. She had moved as silently as a shadow, so they had never noticed her, but she had certainly noticed the ease of their conversation, the merriment in the queen’s laugh, and the abundance of Lord Jon’s usually rare smiles. On some occasions, such as the last time Anke had been in the godswood with them, they had gone into the forest’s relative seclusion to discuss some particularly weighty issue. The Queen had been particularly upset that day, and her voice had risen and trembled during their entire journey to the spring where Lord Jon was often wont to sharpen his sword, although Anke had been unable to make out her words. When the two had finally reached the spring, the queen had begun to wipe at her cheeks, and Anke had realized she must be crying. Lord Jon had taken her into his arms at once, and Anke, upon drawing nearer, had seen his face gentle as it never had before, and heard him speaking in a low voice as one hand rubbed the queen’s back in soothing circles. Eventually the queen had raised her head from his shoulder and nodded at whatever he was saying, and he had rubbed what must have been another tear from her cheek before leaning over and pressing his lips to her forehead. She had offered him a small smile, and he had kissed her cheek before releasing her and offering her his arm. Anke had had to scurry behind the bushes to keep them from seeing her as they left the clearing. They had swept to within a foot or two of her as they had departed, and Anke had seen clearly the tender look the Lord Jon had given his cousin when her eyes had been turned away from his. It was the look of a man besotted by the beauty of his woman, and Anke had half thought he would try to steal her then and there, before she had remembered that he and the queen were, after all, kneelers. She sniggered to herself after the two were safely out of earshot. No wonder Lord Jon hated it so much when the other kneeler lords paid their visits to Winterfell.

 

In the days after that particular excursion, however, Anke had begun to think that the young queen might change her mind about binding ceremonies if she could have one with the Lord Jon. She had smiled more readily and swept about the castle as if a burden had been lifted from her shoulders, and Anke had even witnessed her laughing at one or more of Tormund’s absurd jokes.

 

However, Queen Sansa’s happiness had not been dimmed by the arrival of yet another kneeler lord, which made Anke question whether she had read the other woman aright at all. This vexed her, for she was, after all, a Free Folk healer, trained in the art of reading the eyes and expressions of the afflicted whose wounds or illnesses had rendered them unable to speak. No, Tormund had reported that the queen had taken more calmly than usual her council’s reminder at its meeting the night before the new lord’s arrival that the sooner she married a good lord and produced heirs, the more secure the northern kneelers’ kingdom would be. She had, in fact, all but ignored Lord Jon’s customary bout of growling upon the subject. And after the meeting, she had swept about the castle ordering the preparations for the new lord’s arrival with upturned lips and an air that Anke could only describe as merry.

 

Merry she was before the lord’s arrival, and merrily she greeted him. Anke could forgive her for the manner of her greeting, for the young man was tall, broad, and fair, with a head full of flowing golden locks and a smile to match the queen’s own. Anke herself would have been tempted by him, had he not been a kneeler. Furthermore, she had heard it said that the queen had dreamed as a child of marrying just such a man.

 

However, the longer the welcome feast went on in the great hall, the less Anke liked the new lord. He laughed and talked and heaped countless courtesies upon Queen Sansa whenever she was looking at him; but his speech, when not dedicated to flattering the queen scandalously, revolved almost entirely around himself and his kingdom’s affairs. He seemed to take no particular interest in Winterfell, where, after all, he would have to live were he to wed Queen Sansa. And when the queen was training her attentions elsewhere, his gaze wandered a little too often to various other young women in attendance and lingered a bit too long to be considered innocent even among the Free Folk, let alone a gathering of kneelers. So when he finally swept the young queen into the middle of the hall for a dance, and then refused to let go of her for another two sets, Anke could not blame Lord Jon for glowering at the man over his mead goblet. She only wondered that the queen remained smiling and serene throughout the rest of the evening, especially considering that she usually only danced every other set, and usually no more than two dances with the same man.

 

Anke’s scowl as she swept back to the healers’ chambers that night almost rivaled Lord Jon’s. Whether or not he would ask Queen Sansa’s permission to steal her after that strange kneeler fashion was his own affair; but she had always thought the queen more intelligent than to be taken in, and so quickly, by a flatterer with a wandering eye that any Free Folk wife worth her salt would have carved out had she been unlucky enough to be bound to him.

 

The following morning, on her way into the forest to gather more supplies, Anke walked past the fencing grounds, where she saw the golden-haired kneeler lord sparring with one of his bannermen. Queen Sansa passed through the yard just then, and Anke noticed that she walked more slowly than usual, as if lost in thought or even daydreaming. Her eyes softened as they fluttered past the two men at their swordplay, and Anke rolled her eyes.

 

As soon as the queen was out of earshot, the kneeler lord disarmed his bannerman and tossed his sword to his squire. The bannerman tilted his head in the direction Queen Sansa had just gone.

 

“Not a bad eyeful,” he remarked, “to give up naming your sons Harwood for, if you’ll have to name them ‘Stark.’”

 

His lord produced a look that was more leer than grin.

 

“Not a bad handful, either, I’d say,” he replied. “Or two hands full, more like.” His companion guffawed, and the lord shrugged. “And cockful to boot. Bunch of nice, tight cockfuls, by the look of her.”

 

This time they both burst out laughing. Anke turned away and swept through the yards in disgust. If the other woman insisted on losing her wits all of a sudden, that was her own affair; but neither the North nor kind Queen Sansa, momentary idiocy notwithstanding, deserved to be suffer from the rule of such a revolting lout, and Anke knew just the means to prevent it.

 

Not two hours later, Anke had pounded several dozen blue winterberries into a pulp and added the remaining ingredients needed to form a draught that would put Queen Sansa to sleep for a night and a day. She hesitated a moment before she poured it into a flask, then for several more after the final course of dinner had been served before she pulled aside the serving girl tasked in charge of the royal table’s drinks and instructed her to see that the healing potion for Queen Sansa’s headache be mixed thoroughly with her wine. Anke stuttered at first, so that the serving girl had to ask her to repeat herself; but in the end the instructions were given and the medicine passed off and poured into the queen’s goblet just as Anke had wished.

 

Not half an hour later, Anke saw Queen Sansa yawning and speaking into the Lord Jon’s ear. He nodded and said something back before she shook her head and swept off in the company of her maidservants. Anke’s lips turned up in a thin smile.

 

However, that smile left Anke’s face when the queen and her servants were almost back to her apartments, for it was then that the young woman began coughing and clutching her throat. Anke had kept at a distance as she had followed them through the halls, but even from her vantage point she could see the color draining rapidly from Queen Sansa’s face. She watched in horror as that same gentle face took on a sickly purplish hue.

 

“Anke! Anke!” One of the maidservants was frantically pulling her arm, and Anke broke out of her brief trance and leaped to Queen Sansa’s side. The maidservants had loosened her corsets, and one was slapping her on the face and rubbing her back, but the queen responded only with sharp gasps that shook her whole body as red spots began to appear in her wide-open eyes. Anke sank to the ground and touched the young queen’s neck, wrists, and chest in rapid succession. Beneath the skin of each, she felt a weak and wildly skipping heartbeat.

 

Anke stopped short in terror. Any of the young queen’s symptoms by itself would have indicated some type of poisoning, but all of them appearing at once could only mean one thing.

 

“Get her to her room!” she shouted at the maidservants. “Gently! And set her on her back!”

 

They hastened to obey her, and Anke dashed through the hallways as though all the White Walkers from the war were after her. Fortunately, the healers’ quarters were not terribly far from the queen’s, and even more fortunately, Murron was in the quarters stirring a cauldron of blackberry stew. Next to the cauldron stood Anke’s own workbench, and when she opened her mouth to call out the older healer’s name, nothing came out, for what she saw confirmed her worst fears. Instead of plucking blue winterberries for the queen’s sleeping draught, she had picked several bunches of deadly white winterberries, which budded in a nearly identical shade of blue to their harmless cousins and only turned white upon maturity. Anke could feel her own face going white as the berries as Murron turned to face her.

 

“The Queen,” she finally managed to gasp. “It’s – she’s had white winterberries – Murron – help – ”

 

The older woman’s eyes widened. With a swiftness that belied her age, she grabbed her oak walking stick, which was resting against the opposite wall, and hobbled over to one of the workbenches next to the cauldron. She pulled several pieces of dried red spruce bark out of one of the drawers and handed them to Anke, whose hands were shaking.

 

“How much?” she asked, and Anke told her. The old woman’s eyes widened further, and she yanked open another drawer and pulled out three bunches of herbs.

 

“You are sure?” she asked. Anke, who had just turned toward the door, whirled back around to face the other woman and nodded. Her lower lip began to tremble, which would have shamed her at any other time.

 

“I – the juice is there,” she stuttered, pointing to her work table, where a few of the berries she had discarded still sat. One of the first lessons she had learned when Murron had begun teaching her about poisons was that brewing the antidote to a berry-based poison could be made much simpler if one were to add a single drop of the poison’s source. Murron narrowed her eyes into slits, which Anke knew meant the normally placid woman would boil over along with the cauldron of blackberry stew if she did not receive an explanation. She stammered out her own as quickly as she could. The older healer eyed her sharply for a moment and then brought her cane around in a whistling crack over Anke’s head.

 

“Get you to the queen’s quarters next moment,” she cried, and her shrill voice drowned out Anke’s startled shriek. “And best pray the Old Gods and her Seven alike be with her, or the Lord Jon kills you before I do!”

 

Shaking, Anke dashed out of the healers’ quarters and down the hall. She prayed the entire way to the queen’s quarters, which was just as well, for she arrived to find the younger woman’s bed surrounded by agitated maidservants. One or two were weeping; the others were undressing the queen and wiping her brow and rubbing fingers, which were now turning the color of bruises along with the her face. Anke pushed her way past them all and informed them as firmly as she could that Murron was already brewing an antidote and would be on her way shortly. She shredded a piece of red spruce bark as fast as her shaking fingers would allow her to do and began filling Queen Sansa’s mouth with the splinters. It would be best, she knew, if the queen could chew and swallow them, for then their full virtue would be released into her blood, and, while red spruce bark would not cure her, it would help to slow the spread of the poison.

 

But the queen’s throat had very nearly closed, and no amount of coaxing the girl, whose bloodshot eyes were blinking without any recognition of what was in front of them, could get her to chew. Therefore, the best Anke could do was to put several splinters of bark into the younger woman’s mouth and close her lips around each other. She could feel the gaze of every maidservant in the room on her as she silently begged the gods to open the queen’s throat even a little bit.

 

Perhaps a minute later, the queen’s eyes fluttered open, and her throat relaxed a little. Anke immediately released her lips, and a very shallow breath escaped from them. She managed to get the queen to chew and swallow a couple of the splinters before her eyes closed again and she let out another gasp. Anke swore aloud and reached to shut the queen’s lips around the bark again, but she was interrupted by the slam of the door against the wall. She turned around to face Lord Jon Snow, whose face was as pale as his cousin’s was purple.

 

“Sansa!” he cried, and as he leaped to her bedside, the maidservants parted around him as fast as they could. Anke herself shuffled quickly to her left to make room for the young lord, who collapsed to his knees beside the bed. He seized her right hand with both of his, and when he turned to face Anke, his eyes were wide with horror.

 

“What in the bloody hell happened to her?” he demanded, and though his face was white, his gray eyes had taken on the hue of molten steel. Anke drew back in spite of herself. Those were the eyes of the fiercest swordsman in the North, the eyes of the dragon rider ready to unleash his full fury on whoever had harmed the Lady of Winterfell.

 

Anke gulped, but she was, after all, a woman of the Free Folk and no coward. She raised her chin and told Lord Jon that the queen had ingested white winterberry poison by accident.

 

“I am to blame, my lord,” she said. “I made a mistake when mixing a draught for her. I am feeding her pine bark to slow the poison’s spread until Murron arrives with the antidote. She will be here the moment she has mixed it.”

 

The color in the young lord’s face turned from white to red in a matter of moments. Anke did not know whether he would strike her or beg her to heal the queen sooner, and perhaps he did not know himself. Nor would either of them find out, for just then the door slammed back against the wall once again, and Murron burst into the room with a steaming flask in her hand. She hobbled over to the bed at once, knocking Anke aside with one knee as she did so, and slowly poured the liquid into Queen Sansa’s mouth. Lord Jon’s eyes widened, and his grip on his cousin’s hand tightened. He blinked several times in rapid succession, and his jaw clenched.

 

The entire room froze as Murron finished feeding the queen her antidote. The young woman blinked a few times but did nothing else, and Anke had only to look at Murron’s face as she felt the queen’s wrists, neck, and chest that nothing else had changed.

 

Murron turned to face Lord Jon, and as she did so, the fire reflected the glimmer of fear in her eyes. Anke hoped to the gods that the young man could not see it.

 

“My lord,” the old healer said stiffly, “I have given her the strongest antidote I have, and no more will help her. Best keep her as comfortable as you can now. She will either wake between now and the morn, or she will die.”

 

Lord Jon snapped his head forward in acknowledgement, and his jaw clenched even tighter. Murron nodded in return and swept away from the queen’s bedside. As she did so, she reached down and hauled Anke up by the collar of her dress.

 

“And you – ” she muttered. “You be lucky if the Lord Jon not order your death by sunrise.”

 

But Lord Jon gave only one more order that night. Anke had not quite reached the threshold of the queen’s door when the sudden boom of his voice, raised to a cracking shout, nearly caused her to trip and fall on her face.

 

“Out!” he cried. “Everyone OUT!”

 

The maidservants, who had frozen to a woman, now scurried out of the bedchamber like so many rats. Anke risked one look over her shoulder at Lord Jon’s stricken face before the door slammed shut behind them. The gray fire in his eyes had diminished to a barely lit ember; the mighty dragon warrior had deflated into helpless despair.

 

Anke did not know when Murron released her. She barely felt the chill of the stone at her back as she slumped against the corridor wall and shook like a weeping child.


	2. Chapter 2

Anke’s fingers shook as she held out the piece of linen. Lena, one of the cooks, dropped a carefully tied bundle of dried feverfew flowers into it.

 

“Anything else?” she asked, and Anke shook her head.

 

“No,” she said. “But thank you, and Murron thanks you too.”

 

The other woman nodded briskly. “No trouble,” she answered and turned on her heel, whereupon she began scolding one of the maids immediately for letting the cabbage stew burn in its cauldron.

 

Anke put the feverfew on top of the neatly rolled linen cloths containing the other herbs Murron had ordered her to obtain from the kitchens, where those of the healers’ herbs that could not fit into their own quarters were stored until the healers needed them. She bundled them all into her leather bag and made her way to the staircase on the other side of the kitchen. A few minutes later, she entered the healers’ quarters to find Murron nodding off in one of the chairs. Anke let out a quiet sigh of relief and carefully crept across the room to put the herbs into the proper drawers and cabinets. She folded the linen cloths and replaced them neatly in their usual drawer.

 

A snore rose from the corner of the room. Whether due to her display of wrath earlier that evening when she had discovered Queen Sansa’s poisoning, or her later unleashing of several minutes’ worth of orders for herbs at Anke when the latter had finally gotten the courage to creep back into their quarters, mixed with pointed reminders that if the Lord Jon were to punish Anke on the morrow, she could at least make herself worth something to him and his household tonight, Murron’s strength had clearly run out for the evening. Anke turned out of habit to sneak as quietly as she could to their shared bedchamber, but before she could take so much as a step, she realized how utterly unable she would be to sleep. Working on potions and poultices would wake Murron, and waking Murron would arouse her pointed ire no matter how fatigued she was, but Anke could think of nothing else to do bar going out to the woods to gather more herbs, or simply to run north through the woods and not stop running. The castle’s gates had long since been locked for the night, however; and even if they had not been, Anke was determined to stay and take whatever punishment Lord Jon (or Queen Sansa, if she awoke) deemed just for her. She was one of the Free Folk, not a sniveling coward.

 

Since she could not leave the castle, Anke briefly considered returning to the kitchens and asking if the butchers or cooks needed help, for there were Free Folk among them, and since she could not render aid directly to Queen Sansa or Lord Jon, she could at least offer her services to their household. However, unlike the Free Folk working in the kitchens, Anke had never been a great hand at butchering animals or roasting and spicing the meat or any other such task at which so many of her people were especially skilled. She and her brother had helped in the brewery when they had first arrived at Winterfell as refugees, before he had died fighting the Walkers, and Anke had enjoyed it; but she doubted that even her friends there, let alone anyone else in the castle, wanted to speak to her, since they knew she was the reason their beloved queen was now hovering at the verge of death.

 

Anke sighed again. Murron stopped snoring as she did so, and Anke turned silently on her heels to see the other woman stir in her chair. For a moment she thought the old healer might wake and order Anke to fetch more herbs, but Murron merely shifted in her chair and went still again.

 

Anke wished she were out in the middle of the wood so that she could scream with all her might. The queen’s stricken gasps assaulted her memory over and over, and she felt that if she stayed in the healers’ quarters any longer she would burst and begin screaming anyway, woods or no. She swept noiselessly past the cabinets and out into the hallway.

 

As Anke rounded the corner into the passageway that led to Queen Sansa’s apartments, she heard a distinct thump sounding through the door, which was slightly ajar. She frowned. She remembered the sound of it slamming behind her when Murron had dragged her into the hallway earlier that night. A pang of horror shot through her. Could someone have managed to break into the queen’s rooms and attack her and Lord Jon?

 

No Free Folk woman was ever without her weapons, and Anke had a dagger strapped to each of her legs, as well as a larger knife at her belt. She pulled it out and dashed through the door. As she did so, she heard a muffled roar. It was Lord Jon’s voice. Anke charged through the queen’s solar as fast as she could, but stopped dead in her tracks when she heard him raise his voice again.

 

“Then out with you, Sam!” he snapped, and the door swung open almost at once. Anke barely managed to duck behind the first chair she could find before Samwell Tarly, Winterfell’s maester, emerged. His shoulders were slumped and his step slow, and Anke’s heart leaped into her throat. Perhaps the queen’s condition had deteriorated, or perhaps –

 

Anke’s heart leaped into her throat for a moment, but then she realized that if the queen were dead, Lord Jon would likely not have ceased his shouting, and the maester would be running to fetch the servants and the steward. Since neither of those things was happening, it stood to reason that Maester Tarly, who was an old friend of Lord Jon’s as well as a man of medicine, was merely checking on the welfare of both the room’s occupants.

 

As soon as she heard the maester shut the door to the queen’s apartments, Anke breathed out a long sigh of relief. That relief, however, disappeared a moment later when she heard an anguished groan emanating from the bedchamber, and then another. Anke’s eyes widened. She was, after all, a woman of the Free Folk and not such a terrible hunter, and therefore familiar with the unnerving noises made by mortally wounded animals. Those sounds had always made a part of her stomach turn, although she never would have admitted it; but these, if possible, were even less earthly and more terrifying, as if the gods themselves were slowly pulling Lord Jon apart by his limbs.

 

The reasonable side of Anke knew that the lord was not in fact being pulled apart by his limbs or having any other harm done to his body, and that she could not help him by staying in the queen’s apartments; but his agonized moans drew her to the bedchamber door nevertheless. It was open by less than a hand’s span. Only one lamp was lit, and it sat on the table on the far side of the queen’s bed. Its dim glow revealed Lord Jon’s crumpled silhouette. He had collapsed forward over his knees near the foot of the bed on the side nearer to both the queen and the door. His right hand was entwined with the queen’s own, and his left clutched the back of his head. Based on the noises escaping his mouth, Anke would not have been surprised if he were using that hand to rip his hair out at the roots.

 

Anke did not know how long she stood transfixed at the door. She only knew that at some point, Lord Jon’s dreadful groans had gotten quieter and less guttural until they transformed into sobs. His left hand reached out, clutched the edge of one of the blankets, and pulled mindlessly at it for several minutes. Queen Sansa, of course, did not notice; but at some point Lord Jon seemed to think that she would, and his hand released the blanket and pounded into the floor over and over as though administering the beating that loutish Lord Harwood so richly deserved; or, rather, the beating that Anke herself deserved. Her own body must have agreed with that last thought, for no sooner had Lord Jon’s sobs subsided into hoarse, quiet moans than she tasted the bitter liquid seeping from her lip and realized how deeply her teeth had bitten into it. She quickly released it and sucked it into her mouth, but the blood kept trickling out of the wound for some time. Over the course of that time, Lord Jon’s sobs diminished into hoarse moans. Anke thought his voice must have given out, so she flinched and nearly stumbled into the door when she heard the moans transformed into coherent words: _Sansa, can’t, don’t,_ and, at last, _please._

“Please. Not her. Me. Take me.”

 

Anke almost turned to see who the young lord was addressing before she realized that he must be praying. She knew she should leave, but her feet refused to budge, especially when she heard Lord Jon’s next words.

 

“You’ve already taken me once. Do it again, and do your worst. Take me to darkness. Take me through all seven hells, if you have them. I have done what the red woman said you sent me back to do.” Even his voice’s hoarseness could not disguise its trembling over the last few words.

 

“She has already been through the hells, and she was alive. Only the dead should ever be subjected to it. She should be here. She should be a great queen and strong and happy.” A fit of coughing took him, and he had to clear his throat a few times before he could speak again. Still, the queen did not stir.

 

“Whichever of us you take, I die. Consider that. If she lives and I die, you have your will with me. If she dies, she takes every part of me that lives. I will be flesh, bones, and sword, nothing more. I will be useless to any more of your purposes. I care nothing for them. I am dead already without her. Let me die again, and leave her. Leave her. Leave her.”

 

His voice trailed off to a whisper, and then he began to cry again. Again, Anke’s feet refused to move. Her chest tightened as Lord Jon continued to sob, and after some time her head began to feel light. Cursing her weakness, she sank to the floor as soundlessly as she could.

 

The candle by Queen Sansa’s bedside flickered, throwing the young woman’s face into sharper relief for a few moments. Anke shuddered in spite of herself when she saw how utterly the angry purple patches had covered the queen’s face and neck. She wondered if they were the kind that caused feverish nightmares, or perhaps the burning pains that would torment an afflicted person endlessly even in his or her sleep. Anke had experienced the latter as a child when she had caught the summer pox, but her healer’s training had taught her that poisoning usually tortured its victims far worse than would a simple childhood affliction. She shuddered again, and her chest tightened even further. Then the shudder turned to a cavernous yawn, and Anke let out a silent curse, and that one curse quickly became a perpetual stream.

 

Murron had been right to smack her over the head with the cane. Murron had been right to say the Lord Jon should order her death. Murron had been right to drag her out of the queen’s apartments and deposit her in a dark corner of the hallway like a forgotten pile of rags. And if the gods should take anyone in Queen Sansa’s place, it should be her, and certainly not the Lord Jon, who still lay whimpering on the floor, no doubt still pleading with them to end his life. Anke screwed her eyes shut and prayed as fervently as she could that the gods would take her instead, if anyone. There was precious little chance any of them would heed her, she knew, and less chance still that they would forgo the opportunity to let a man as pure-hearted as Lord Jon sacrifice himself for the woman who owned that heart so completely. Still, she kept praying and yawning despite herself, and still Lord Jon groaned as though he himself were suffering the effects of the winterberry poison. After a time, his groans got fewer and further between, and so did Anke’s yawns, and her prayers stuttered to a halt.

 

Anke’s head snapped up with a jerk. She was curled up against the doorframe, and she had lost the feeling in her left arm. She pulled herself upright with a curse and immediately clapped her hand over her mouth for fear that Lord Jon had heard her. Instead, once her heart had ceased pounding in her ears, she heard the raspy murmur of his voice. A tentative peek through the cracked door showed that he was kneeling beside the bed, holding the queen’s right hand with both of his own, rubbing one of his thumbs in gentle circles along the back of it.

 

“Sansa,” he said tenderly, over and over, almost singsong. “Sansa, my love. My love.”

 

Anke’s chest tightened again, and she bit her tongue. Had she been a kneeler and not a woman of the Free Folk, she might have been crying. Instead, she began to lift herself up along the doorframe. Lord Jon would never notice her leaving, any more than he had noticed her presence to begin with.

 

Instead, he cleared his throat, and Anke stumbled against the doorframe so hard that she smacked her kneecap against the corner. She clapped her hand over her mouth to muffle the curses, but still Lord Jon took no notice of her.

 

“I am a coward, my love,” he whispered, and despite the pain in her knee, Anke almost snorted. One might more aptly call Tormund Giantsbane a laughing child. But kneelers had their own ideas of cowardice, although Anke had the feeling that even the kneelers would think Lord Jon strange for what he had just said.

 

“I did not want them here. I would have fought them away from you if you had not been kinder than I. I wanted you to choose me for a husband. I have wanted it for – for years, my love. I should have asked you then, but I – I did not want to cause you pain, and I was afraid you would choose another.” He paused and cleared his throat again, and his voice had lowered when he spoke again. “Instead, I was selfish. I did cause you pain. I know how tired you got every time another one of them showed up.” He let out a long breath. “I should never have let things go on this way. I should have asked at the least if you wanted it all put to an end. I am sorry, love. I am sorry, so sorry.”

 

Both his hands and his voice trembled as he spoke the last words, and so it took a few moments before either he or Anke realized that Queen Sansa’s hand had begun to twitch too. Lord Jon had just opened his eyes and begun to gape in astonishment when a distinct groan escaped the young woman’s lips, and her body shifted toward his.

 

“Sansa!” Lord Jon moved a hand upward to rub her shoulder. “Sansa – Sansa! Can you hear me, love?”

 

The queen groaned again. She wheezed in and then even more mightily out, and her body shuddered for a few moments before it stilled and lay silent upon the bed.

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

Anke clapped her hands over her mouth to stifle a scream. Lord Jon looked as though he would either collapse or vomit, but instead his right hand reached across the bed to grab the queen’s left, and he began to shake both with such speed that all four hands blurred in front of Anke’s eyes.

 

“Sansa!” he cried. “Sansa! My love, please, please, can you hear me?”

 

Even Anke did not think the queen would ever answer him again, but after some time she breathed in and let out another groan. Her body turned even further toward the young lord, and he whispered her name over and over. Gradually her breathing became stronger and more even, and her hand trembled and reached out to clutch some of the covers at her side. Still, it took a few more minutes and many more urgent repetitions of her name before her eyes began to blink – rapidly at first, then more slowly. Lord Jon rose and bent over to move the hand that had been on her shoulder to cup her cheek. At last she managed to focus her eyes on the young lord’s face.

 

“Jon,” she whispered. Lord Jon’s own hand shook, and he made an odd choking noise before he cleared his throat again.

 

“Sansa,” he whispered. “Sansa. Sansa. Can you hear me, sweetling?”

 

The young queen blinked again. This time the corners of her lips turned upward.

 

“Mhhmmm,” she hummed in assent. Lord Jon stroked her cheek again and bent to plant a lingering kiss on her forehead.

 

“I am glad,” he replied, and let out a shaky laugh. “Gods, but I am glad.”

 

Queen Sansa’s brow wrinkled. “Glad? What has – oh.” Her eyes widened. “Did I take ill at the feast, then? I was not sure whether I had dreamed that.”

 

Lord Jon stopped laughing at once. He had to clear his throat again before he recounted the events of the last several hours. At first the queen narrowed her eyes to concentrate on the young lord’s words, but by the time he had finished his tale, she was nodding. Anke let out a shaky breath of her own: apparently the poison had done no lasting damage to the queen’s mind.

 

“I thought you were lost,” Lord Jon whispered. “No one could do anything. I – ” He paused for several moments. The queen reached over with her free hand and settled it gently on top of his.

 

“But I am not,” she replied. “I am here, and now Murron and Sam can disapprove of my giving them a fright as much as they like.”

 

Lord Jon looked as if he would very much like to disapprove of the queen’s lightheartedness. Instead, he turned his hand so that the back of it rested against her forehead.

 

“Hmm,” he murmured. “You’re still warm to the touch. Do you feel too warm, sweetling?”

 

The queen shrugged. “Only a little,” she said, and Lord Jon let out another quiet “Hmm” and cocked his head at her. He had that tender look in his eyes again, the same one he had given her when they had left the godswood those two weeks ago.

 

“But you are not in pain?” he asked. “Or chills, or upset of the stomach?”

 

Queen Sansa shook her head. “No,” she replied. “My limbs only feel weak, nothing more. I am sure they will strengthen soon enough.”

 

Lord Jon nodded, but gave no reply save to stroke her cheek gently again. Queen Sansa bit her lip and shifted her gaze just sideways of his, perilously close to the doorway. Anke shrank back against the wall beside it.

 

“Jon.” The queen hesitated. One syllable had turned her voice from tranquil to taut, which piqued Anke’s curiosity enough to make her risk peering through the doorway again. Queen Sansa shifted one hand off of Jon’s and twisted it into the covers, and he gave her a concerned look. She trained her eyes on her stray hand before she continued.

 

“I am going to bid Lord Harwood leave today,” she said, finally looking him in the face. “He is a lout, and I will see him gone.”

 

Lord Jon nodded at once. “Good,” he growled, his voice raspy from the crying. “So will I.”

 

Anke cocked her head and squinted at Queen Sansa, who only a day ago had been staring at the brutish lord as though he were all the stars in the heavens combined. It was odd behavior even for a kneeler, and Anke half wondered if the poison had not quite worn off of her yet. Then the young woman squared her shoulders and straightened her neck, and that gesture at least was entirely normal. She sometimes used it when about to go to battle with a particularly stubborn lord at council. Now she looked as though she would do battle with herself.

 

“I do not mean to entertain any more lords here, Jon, if you wish it,” she finally said. Her left hand, the one not ensconced in the young lord’s, was trembling.

 

Lord Jon stared at her nonplussed for a few moments.

 

“If – no, Sansa, you – I – you should do as you wish, not as I wish,” he answered, and his cheeks began to redden. The queen shook her head.

 

“I do not wish for any more,” she whispered. “I thought I heard – just before I woke – I thought you said you would like to be here instead of them, as my husband.” She bit her lip again, but she met Lord Jon’s gaze head on. Her eyes shone with the same tender delight Anke had seen when the queen had danced with Lord Harwood for three sets only two nights earlier, so close to the dais, where Lord Jon had been sitting at the high table –

 

Anke’s eyes squeezed shut. Lord Harwood, as was the custom among kneelers, had led every dance, but more than once, the queen had tilted her shoulder to steer both of them closer to the high table. Lord Jon had sat there watching the dancers and speaking an occasional word to another lord as was his wont, for he rarely danced, and then almost always with the queen. Anke had thought nothing of it at the time amid her astonishment that Queen Sansa had agreed to a third dance with the brute. She had assumed the young woman had been making moon eyes at the kneeler lord, but if she had instead been smiling at Lord Jon, it would explain why her eyes had not been focusing on the former. Now that Anke thought about it, the young queen had been beaming wit that same faraway grin in the training yards. On her way into the woods that day, she had gone from one end of the yards to the other, and after she had left Lord Harwood and his equally loutish companion behind, she had seen the Lord Jon’s direwolf at the other end. If Lord Jon had been training nearby, and the queen had been looking at him instead, and Anke had not gotten it into her head to pick winterberries at all –

 

“Aye.” The king’s voice swept Anke away from her thoughts. “I did.”

 

His cheeks had gotten even redder, but he kept his gaze on the queen, who looked like a new father watching the healer emerge from his laboring wife’s quarters to give him news of the woman and babe.

 

“I do,” Lord Jon continued at last. “I wish it very much.” The queen’s eyes widened, and he reached out to stroke a stray strand of hair behind her ear with his thumb. “But only if you are willing. If you are not – ” he gulped– “I will never say it again.” His face paled as he said it, and his jaw tightened, but his gaze never left hers.

 

“No,” Queen Sansa whispered at once, and the color began to seep back into the lord’s face. “I mean, no, I do not want you not to speak of it again. I only did not think you considered me that way, let alone for so long.”

 

The young lord sighed and nodded. “Too long, I know. I should have said it to you before, Sansa. I only thought you would get angry and think me grasping and – and brutish and order me away, and I could not bear to be parted from you.”

 

The queen pursed her lips as she had done countless times with stubborn lords at council, although she could not keep her voice from quavering just a little when she spoke. “Jon, I was married to Ramsay Bolton, and both before and afterwards I have been subjected to grasping brutishness from gods know how many lords from here to King’s Landing. You cannot possibly think yourself like any of them.”

 

The tips of Lord Jon’s ears grew red. “I only meant – I did not want to make you uncomfortable,” he replied. “We were told for so long that I was your brother. If you thought of me such, I could not – ” He grimaced.”

 

The queen shook her head. “You have not been my brother for a long time,” she admonished him. Lord Jon shook his own head in return.

 

“I still knew how little you wanted to marry anyone,” he answered. “It was bad enough that my aunt was bothering you about it.”

 

Queen Sansa nodded. “True enough,” she conceded, but her voice still had not steadied. She tilted her head, as if to distract herself, and regarded him with some curiosity. “Wait. You thought about – all of this that long ago?”

 

Lord Jon flushed again. “Aye – well, not long after my aunt left for King’s Landing,” he said. “When we first took in everyone who had no place after the Walkers destroyed their homes, I remember hearing you telling Duncan every time he said we could not fit any more people into Winterfell that we would do it anyway, and once you starting going on at him the way you did at me the night before we took it back from Ramsay Bolton, and I remember thinking the poor man had no idea what he was up against.” One corner of his mouth quirked upward. “Once you’d left him, I remember you turned straight around to hold one of the children who was screaming with fright because the healer was tending her mother, you got down on your knees and held her and spoke to her and smiled at her like your own. So unlike what poor Duncan had got.” He shrugged. “I thought if she had been, she would have been the luckiest child in the world. And then I thought that if the child were ours and I your husband, I would be even luckier. Even if you got that angry at me sometimes, I would still be luckier.”

 

Anke flushed. She recalled that Queen Sansa had taken a similar approach to Winterfell’s burly steward on behalf of herself and her clan when he had bristled about housing yet another round of Wildlings. The man towered nearly a foot over the young queen, but she had fixed him with a withering glare and reminded him never to call Anke’s people anything but “Free Folk” again.

 

“…and then I thought you might find another lord more to your liking some day,” Lord Jon was saying when Anke’s ears followed her focus back to him and the queen. “Not to mention one the council would like. Not a Targaryen,” he added. The queen narrowed her eyes.

 

“I care not what your name is, even if it were Lannister,” she replied. “Nor does it matter what the council thinks. Some of the lords whom they would like are decent enough, but I would not give them rule over our guest quarters, let alone share the North with them. The others are like him.” She inclined her head toward the doorway. Anke jumped backwards out of her sight, but not before she saw the queen’s hand fidgeting with the covers again. Lord Jon reached over and began stroking the back of it with his thumb, and the queen’s body relaxed.

 

“No,” she continued. “Perhaps I would have jumped at such a man were I twelve years old and a fool again.” She paused, and her voice lowered almost to a whisper. “You said you would have thought yourself lucky were I to accept you, but I am the lucky one. I have been lucky to have you here just as you have been, let alone to care for me as you do. I was fool enough not even to understand that until you told me in the godswood that day the other week, after I got into that row with Davos and I was so upset because I thought he would hate me, and you comforted me so beautifully.” He eyes shone, and the tender look came back to them. “You said that you would never leave Winterfell as long as I wished you here, and only then did I understand how stupid I had been, taking it for truth without asking that you would not have found a lady to your own liking. You were not the only selfish one, Jon.”

 

Lord Jon stared at her as if the poison had given her an extra head as well as purple patches all over her skin. “No, no, no,” he finally said. “No. I never wanted that. Only with you.” He lifted his hand to his lips and pressed a gentle kiss to the back. This time it was Queen Sansa’s ears that grew red.

 

“I only wanted it with you, too,” she replied at last. “That is, once I stopped being stupid and saw how badly I wanted you to stay. And how little I had hoped till then to have half as kind and good a husband as you would be.” Her lips twitched, and Lord Jon bent to kiss her forehead again.

 

“My love,” Anke barely heard him whisper. Queen Sansa rewarded him with the same adoring smile she had flashed at him across the hall and the training yard.

 

“Do I get to call you that?” she asked teasingly, and hesitated for a moment before adding, “My love, Jon?”

 

The grin Lord Jon gave her in return made Anke worry that his mouth would burst open.

 

“If my queen commands it,” he replied. Queen Sansa raised a hand to cup his cheek.

 

“Then I command it, my love,” she said. Lord Jon slowly released her hand and moved his own to cradle the back of her head. His thumb stroked another lock of hair behind her ear, and his eyes flickered to her lips for a moment before returning to meet hers. Her expression turned solemn, but there was no trace of fear in it.

 

“My love,” the young lord murmured, and kissed her brow once again. His voice sank to a whisper. “My love.” He moved his lips to her temple. “My love.” His thumb traced the curve of her lips, which bent upward. He drew back, but only a little and for a moment. Her thumb reached out to mirror his gesture, and in the gray light of dawn flowing into the room, Anke could see that he was gazing at her face, still riddled with patches of lavender like old bruises, as if she herself were the morning sun and all the life that came from it.

 

“My love,” he repeated. His head inched downward and her eyes slid shut just before his lips brushed hers. She let out a soft hum and reached out to entwine her arms around his neck, and he kissed her again, this time more firmly. He put an arm around her back and carefully drew her upward to take her into his arms. In all that time their lips did not part, nor was the queen now the only one humming in pleasure.

 

Anke felt the heat rise to her face. She had always thought none of the Free Folk should blush or fear to look at aught their eyes chanced upon; but now she understood that some things were so sacred, that even the Free Folk must look away. Besides, she might as well leave now, when she had less than no chance of being noticed.

 


	4. Chapter 4

Later that day, Lord Harwood and his retinue were packed off with as little ceremony as the queen could manage. Anke was too busy scrubbing every inch of the healers’ quarters under Murron’s disapproving eye to watch them go.

 

The following day, Queen Sansa summoned both women to her solar. She had never demanded that any of the Free Folk bow or curtsey to her, and Anke had never bothered before; but that day she gave the other woman a pronounced nod. At any other time she would have cursed herself for keeping her hands clasped together so tightly that the queen would not see them shake, although Murron had spent every minute since the summons letting her know exactly how badly she should be trembling.

 

“She be within her rights to order your head off the Lord Jon,” she had berated Anke as the latter had finished drying one of the smaller cauldrons. “And if she order you to the dungeons, you might count yourself lucky.”

 

But the queen welcomed both women warmly and even offered them spiced wine. Anke had never cared for the drink, but she accepted it just the same.

 

“Murron,” said Queen Sansa once the maidservants had served the wine and left the room, “I understand you wished to join us.”

 

“Aye, I did,” replied the old healer once she had taken a long pull from her own glass of wine. “If a girl of this age – ” she jabbed a finger at Anke – “cannot tell the difference between the true fruit and the poisonous, she has no call to be a healer. I choose my new apprentice today. By the evening, I will send word to you and the Lord Jon who I have.”

 

Anke nearly dropped her glass on the floor. She jerked her body around to stare at Murron, who was regarding her with unabashed scorn. Out of instinct, Anke tightened her jaw just in time to hide its trembling. If she had no place at Winterfell, she could do nothing save try to make her way several leagues to the north, where a few of her people had gone months ago to reform one of the old Free Folk settlements. It would take her days to get there, even on a good horse, and she could hardly hope the queen would lend her one of those. She risked a glance at the younger woman, who nodded slowly.

 

“Very well,” she said. “I must ask to speak with Anke alone, however.”

 

Murron rose and left the queen’s chambers muttering to herself. Anke clasped her hands together so tightly that her fingertips began to feel numb. She wanted more than anything to explain that she had not tried to harm a hair of her head, to implore her to at least let Anke say her farewells to her family before she left or suffered whatever punishment Queen Sansa had for her. But that would have been an unheard-of impudence even among the Free Folk, so Anke kept her lips sealed.

 

“I must ask what kind of medicine you believed I needed, Anke,” said the queen at last. Anke dared to look up and saw to her surprise that the younger woman looked bemused instead of angry.

 

“Not poisonous medicine, my queen,” she protested at once. “I intended you no harm. I only ever wished to use the blue winterberries, not the white ones. Murron was right to say I am no right healer for my carelessness. I never meant for you to be poisoned or in pain. I am so very sorry.” She bit her tongue to keep her lips from trembling, but felt them quiver anyway.

 

If the queen was surprised to see such a display from one of the Free Folk, she did not show it. Instead, she shook her head and regarded Anke thoughtfully.

 

“No, I understand that,” she said at last. “I bear you no grudge, Anke. But I did not ask you for medicine that night, and Jon – Lord Jon – said you told him you had given me some.”

 

Anke felt her cheeks go redder than Lord Jon’s had ever gotten when he had spoken to the queen in her chambers two nights ago.

 

“I made a mistake, my queen,” she said, forcing herself to look the other woman straight in the eyes. “I tried to make a sleeping draught because I was fool enough to think you liked that lord who just left. He is a disgusting brute, and I did not want him to marry you.”

 

She cringed at just how much of a fool she had made herself sound. The queen let out a gust of laughter, and Anke felt the redness spread to the tips of her ears.

 

“Like him?” Queen Sansa exclaimed. “No, I did not like him. I agree with you that he is a disgusting brute, which is why I bade him leave.” She fixed Anke with a curious look. “I must wonder what I did to have you think I favored him.”

 

Anke thought her face must resemble a summer beet by now, but she stumbled as best she could through her explanation. By the time she finished, the queen was smiling, and her eyes took on a bit of the same deliciously happy haze that had so confused Anke the night the kneeler lord had arrived at Winterfell.

 

“I never thought I looked so obvious as that,” she said when Anke had gone silent. “I am a fool then too; but I am not sorry for any of it now.” Her eyes focused and fixed on Anke once more. “In fact, I must thank you, Anke, which is a part of why I asked for you. Had you not made your mistake, Jon – Lord Jon and I would not be betrothed to each other now.”

 

Anke’s jaw fell open. When she finally managed to close it, she swallowed a gulp of air that took a fit of coughing to expel.

 

“Are you well?” Queen Sansa actually looked concerned, and in due time Anke recovered her tongue.

 

“Yes, my queen, and I am so glad for you and the Lord Jon both,” she said, and she smiled for the first time in days. “I congratulate you happily.”

 

The queen beamed again. “I thank you,” she said. “We will not announce it until the morrow, so I ask that you speak of it to no one; but you brought us to this pass, even if not in the way you had intended, so I thought you should know.”

 

Anke could only stammer her thanks, but the queen shook her head.

 

“We are at evens to thank each other, then,” she said. “I would ask you to prepare no more sleeping draughts; but since Murron has made her decision, I would like to know if you would prefer to stay at Winterfell or join those of your people who have gone to the north. You are free to do as you choose, of course.”

 

Anke promptly lost her tongue again. When she finally regained her ability to blink, her eyes felt wet for the first time since her mother had died during their clan’s flight to Winterfell during the war.

 

“I – you are not – but I will stay, and do anything you like,” she finally stammered. “You have done me much more kindness than I have deserved by not making me leave at once at the very least.”

 

But the queen did not stop smiling. “Only if you wish it, Anke,” she said gently. “Lord Jon and I bear you no ill will.” She tilted her head for a moment. “If I have been told aright, you worked in the brewery at one time. Would you like to return there?”

 

So it was that the following day, Anke celebrated the betrothal of Queen Sansa and Lord Jon by clashing her mug of fresh mead against those of her old friends in the brewery. Two months later, at the couple’s wedding feast, the celebrations made such a dent in contents of Winterfell’s cellars that Anke had to cease her regular work and help the others haul keg and barrel alike across the snowy courtyard to replenish the stores. After some time, they finally joined what seemed like every last inhabitant of the castle in the great hall, except for the queen and her new king, who had vanished somewhere in the middle of the dancing. Anke was shocked to see that even Murron had left the healers’ quarters and was enjoying a pint-sized mug of ale in the corner.

 

“Not driven you out, then, have they?” she said when Anke greeted her. “Thought it fine of you to have been the fool to finally drive that Lord Jon to tell the queen his love, I heard.” Anke reddened, and the old woman shook her head. “Fool you are, then. Lucky fool. Very lucky.”

 

Anke reddened, but she could not help smiling anyway. Murron shook her head, but she lifted her mug a fraction of an inch off the table. Anke smiled again and headed out into the hall to join in the rest of the revelers.

 


End file.
